Portugal - Peniche and Lisbon

I woke up in Braga, and I had to admit that I would miss the bathtub and the view. Especially the view from the tub. If I could have had at least the bathtub shipped home, I would have.

It being a Saturday, there was no work, so we headed back to Lisbon. On the way, we stopped in Peniche, or rather, the beach at Peniche. The weather was okay, though the wind a bit chilly. My knees started to hurt, and I was sure that the temperature would drop come evening. The first beach location was Papôa, which is a kind of tiny peninsula. Under the rocks there was a very interesting part, but all a bit slippery, and I had to pay very close attention to where I was stepping. I kind of wished I had my rock climbing shoes. There was a guy fishing at the very tip of the rocks, but I found this almost flat rock where I got a bit of sun. I almost fell asleep to the sound of the waves.

After that I was getting tired and ready to go to Lisbon, but we ended up going to another point, the Lighthouse of Cabo Carvoeiro. The lighthouse itself was fine, but the surroundings! Lots of cats, and I saw a cat lady feeding them, There was also trash everywhere. And birds. It also smelled. It was all kind of disgusting. I also had to climb down a really steep set of rocks, and my bad knees were getting worse. By the end I was really in pain. Not my favourite part of Portugal, and definitely needs some cleaning up!

In the evening we finally arrived to the hotel, Ibis Lisboa Parque das Nacoes. A budget affair, but in a good location.

Review:

Functional

This is a budget hotel, and there's no escaping that. However, the location is good, so if you're not bothered much by how fancy the hotel is, this is the place for you.

Let's start with the room. It's really quite small. The bed took up most of the room, and the rest of the floor was taken up by my suitcase. It had a desk and a place to sit, though my window looked over a wall. The TV was small, but there was a good selection of channels, and some in English as well. 

The bathroom was not as small as it could have been. It had a shower, which was a comfortable size. There was some soap that I could use in the shower, and towels. A hairdryer too.

Breakfast was nice. Not a massive selection, but a good one. A problem spot was the single orange juicer, which even broke down one morning. It needs to be automatic, or there need to be more of them, because that was the bottle-neck in the flow of breakfast.

Overall, a comfortable, functional hotel in a central location.

After checking in, we went to have dinner. I really wasn't much in the mood, as I had a killer headache, and the weather was turning cold and bad again. However, on the way back from the nearby mall where they had a Vitaminas, there was a surprise. They were holding some sort of a celebration of the local samba schools, and there were dancers and music around. I stayed, and shot a really long video. I was in a much better mood when I got back to my room. Thanks to the painkiller I took, my headache felt better too.